Cold Water
by MrsTater
Summary: Windows for Bruce and Natasha are open for about as long as hot water lasts in the Barton farm. Natasha is determined not to miss their window-or get stuck taking a cold shower. Part Two in the Running With It series.


_**A/N: Written for the alternate universe prompt at HulkWidowNet's Four Weeks of Prompts, this is a companion piece to**_ **Party Crashers,** _ **in which Ultron doesn't attack the Avengers till**_ **after** _ **Bruce and Natasha have had a chance to "run with it," so to speak. ;) In fact, I'm just going to make this a little mini-series, entitled "Running With It." I hope you enjoy this more, um,**_ **optimistic** _ **take on how Bruce and Natasha's relationship might have gone in AoU if Joss Whedon weren't so determined to make the Avengers unhappy.**_

* * *

 **Cold Water**

Water drummed against the floor of the shower, its rhythm hypnotic even as Natasha heard it muted from outside the bathroom door. Bruce had slipped off while she was with the kids. She pictured him on the other side, standing beneath the hard spray, shoulders hunched, head hung, hair heavy with water and hiding his face.

He hadn't spoken on the flight from South Africa. None of them had as they struggled to shake off the hold Strucker's witch still had on their minds. Only when Lila launched herself into Natasha's arms had she felt she was finally beginning to get a grip on herself again.

Bruce had been in there for a good fifteen, twenty minutes. The dust of Johannesburg would have rinsed from his skin by now, long gone down the drain. Knowing Bruce, he wanted to wash himself away, too.

Her fingers curled around the doorknob. Blood pulsing in her ears in tempo with the shower, she turned it, before she could second-guess her impulsive decision.

"Be out in a minute," Bruce's voice came dully from behind the shower curtain.

Damn antique door, always sticking in the frame and making stealth impossible even for a super spy. Then again, maybe it wasn't a good idea to catch Bruce totally off-guard right now. Still, Natasha didn't reply, just padded across the tiled floor she'd helped Clint lay years back. God, she hated grout.

"Someone in here?" Bruce called. "Hello?"

"Hi."

The shower curtain rings scraped on the rod as Natasha pulled it back to reveal Bruce, scrambling to cover himself with the nearest object in reach-a loofah. It would've been hilarious if there were anything remotely funny about the day that brought them to this point.

"Relax," she said. "I've seen you naked before."

He didn't relax, the edges of his collarbones sharp against his skin as he tensed in on himself.

"Not voluntarily." He formed the words through tight lips, stared at a point at the end of the shower.

"Here." Natasha tugged the belt of the robe she'd borrowed from Laura, drew her arms from the sleeves as it slid off and puddled to the floor. "Now we're even."

The dark eyes which had been steadfastly avoiding her betrayed him, flicking toward her and fixing directly on her breasts. She couldn't help but smile as his clasped hands tightened around that loofah.

Her movement to step over the side of the bathtub to get in with him snapped him out of it.

"Tasha," he breathed her name, "what are you doing?"

"Running with it. I saw a window-" She pulled the shower curtain closed behind her. "Or a shower curtain, whatever. So I seized it."

"Carpe shower curtain?" he attempted to joke, but the slight upward twitch of his mouth sagged almost immediately with his sigh. "You don't want-"

"-to take a cold shower," she interrupted, joining him under the spray of the shower. "Hot water doesn't last long at the farm, I'm afraid."

Reaching around him to adjust the tap, she felt the warmth of his skin against her biceps, the wiry hair, wet and plastered to his chest, brushing softly against her nipples, his tight fisted hands and that stupid loofah at the v of her thighs.

"Then I'll get out," he said. "You don't want me. Not after-"

"-last night? I think I made it pretty clear when we made out after the party that I do."

"That was different."

She reached up, pushed the soggy curls back from his forehead, tracing the line of his brow with her fingertip town to his cheekbone. His stomach cinched away from hers with the hitch of his breath.

"Nothing's changed, Bruce."

" _Everything's_ changed." His voice broke, just like Johannesburg.

"Okay." Natasha cradled his face, the stubble, softened by the warm water, bristling against her palms. "It has. But we're gonna be okay. I'll get you through this."

He leaned into her touch, rested his forehead against hers, or at least allowed her to draw him to her.

"I'm sorry I couldn't today," she murmured, her mouth a breath away from his.

Bruce unclasped his hands, the loofah tickling her feet as it fell, and circled her wrists delicately with his fingers.

"That wasn't your fault," he said, lowering her hands from his face, but not releasing them, holding them against his chest. "That witch…what she did to you…" He leaned back, slightly, to meet her eyes. "What _did_ she do to you?"

Now it was Natasha who looked away, grateful for the running water to hide the sudden sharp sting in her eyes as those images of her _graduation ceremony_ drifted once more to the front of her mind. She didn't answer right away, for a moment watching her fingers stroke his skin.

"Tasha."

Pulling her hands free from his, she reached for the bar of soap from the ledge, lathered it across his chest and shoulders.

"She showed me what the Red Room made me. An emotionless killer with no attachments. So if you ever feel like the only monster on the team-"

"You're not a monster," Bruce said, almost roughly, in contrast with the gentleness of his touch as his hands settled in the curves of her waist.

"Neither are you. Never to me. Not even the Big Guy."

Her free hand slid over his soapy chest to his neck, the wet ends of his hair curling around her fingers as she tilted her face up to meet his mouth at the same moment as he bent to kiss her. Softly, at first, but also with an insistence that hadn't been there last night. (Had it really been less than twenty-four hours since Ultron interrupted their private after-party?) Bruce's arms snaked around her, his fingers sliding between the notches of her spine, pressing her body closer to his.

 _Not close enough._ Natasha fumbled at the shower wall for the ledge to put the soap on and free her hand. She missed, and it hit the floor with a _thunk_ that gave Bruce a slight start. He didn't break the kiss, though, instead let her deepen it, opening to her tongue with a low moan as she wrapped her other arm around his neck, drawing herself up on her toes.

He didn't believe what she'd said about him not being a monster; she'd seen that in his eyes in the split-second before their lips touched. But he wanted to. For Bruce Banner to let himself want anything was a long way from where she'd met him in Kolkata.

The echo of her own voice began to retreat from the front of her mind where the witch had put it. _I have no place in this world._ Right now, right here, she did.

Bruce's touch grew bolder. One hand slid down the curve of her back, making her arch against his hips, until he was cupping her ass. The other skimmed over her ribcage, stroking the underside of her breast with his thumb. Gasping, Natasha let go of his neck to clasp her hand over his, bringing it up to cover her breast fully.

Need surged through her to have every part of him touching every part of her. She rocked back onto the soles of her feet and took a step backward toward the shower wall, and Bruce shuffled with her as she reached for his hips.

"Oh God," he said, but not because of the passion of the moment.

Instinct turned to reflex as he lurched, suddenly off-balance, his hand flying from her breast to catch hold of something and keep himself upright. Natasha's feet scrabbled for purchase on the slick porcelain floor, and she managed not only to regain her own balance, but to clasp Bruce hard by the hips and stop him from falling, too.

The same could not, however, be said for the shower curtain, which had been the thing he grabbed onto.

It crashed down, clanking off the edge of the tub and then hitting the tile floor with a clank that would definitely be heard in the next room.

For a moment after the echo drowned away into the steady patter of the shower they stood there, staring at the fallen shower curtain as steam swirled freely around the green and white tiled bathroom. The plastic liner pooled at their feet, dripping onto the floor where it draped over the edge of the tub.

Bruce facepalmed, and Natasha let go of him.

"That wasn't quite what I meant by seizing the shower curtain," she said as she bent to pick it up, "but honestly it's about what I'd expect from you."

"I slipped on the soap." Bruce avoided eye contact again as he raked his fingers back through his wet hair. "Guess the Other Guy isn't the only one who breaks things."

"I meant the beer bottles you kicked over the last time we made out."

A smile pulled at the corner of his mouth, and slowly stretched across his face as he lowered hands and lifted his eyes to hers.

"I'll do my best not to make it a habit." He lifted the other end of the shower curtain rod and put it back into place.

"Might be too late for that," Natasha replied, stooping to pick up the soap and placing it firmly on the ledge, "but I adore you anyway."

She drew him in and kissed him again.

They stayed in the shower until the water ran cold.


End file.
